Counter-Strike, the world’s number one online action game series, is a first-person shooter developed by Valve Software, the creators of the renowned Half-Life series. This team-oriented online shooter pits terrorists and counter-terrorists against one another in round-based combat set all over the world. Using the power of the “Source” engine, the original Counter-Strike has been completely remade as Counter-Strike: Source—offering upgraded graphics, levels, and the implementation of a new physics engine. Counter-Strike will never be the same!

First released to the public on June 18th, 1999, Counter-Strike began as a simple fan-produced mod for Half-Life. Thanks to a series of steadily-improving beta releases, the mod started to foster a progressively-enlarging and dedicated following. As the fast-paced, tactical game play was refined and improved, and as new concepts and maps were introduced, Counter-Strike moved from being a mere Half-Life mod to an entirely new game.

With the release of Steam, Valve's digital content delivery system, Counter-Strike found a new footing within the gaming community. Counter-Strike’s first single-player chapter, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero (Developed by Valve and Turtle Rock Studios), was a great success, bringing many new features and upgraded graphics to the classic game. The release of Counter-Strike: Source only helped boost the series further towards its now legendary status. Counter-Strike is about as close as you’ll ever get to saving the world; or destroying it!

What’s in This Section?

Counter-Strike not only revolutionized the world of modding, but the entire Half-Life community, and we’re happy to show off our admiration of this revolutionary series with our collection of overviews, guides, strategies, tweaks, and tricks. Want to buff up on your Counter-Strike knowledge? Check out our overview sections. Need help “pwning n00bs” on de_dust? Swing by our map strategies section. Having trouble getting the most FPS out of your computer? We’ve got tech guides at your disposal. Want to turn your grenades into something more cute and cuddly, or change your Counter-Strike menu background? Head over to our files section for mods, maps, models, and more! Welcome to the last place you will ever need to go for all of your Counter-Strike needs!

A while back a laundry list of changes were run through the CS:S Beta, looking like they were headed for mainstream. With today's update it would appear that Valve hasn't forgotten the old girl after all and has made some significant updates to the weapons and associated systems. Here's the highlights:

Dynamic crosshair now uses actual weapon accuracy, rather than a separate simulation

Weapon spread patterns are no longer square

All weapons now have a new accuracy model which fixes many bugs and provides more intuitive weapon behavior

Weapons now have separate accuracy penalties for jumping, landing, and standing on ladders

All weapons are now more accurate while crouching

Accuracy penalties for movement no longer have a discrete threshold, but scale between crouch move and run speed

In addition to the systemic changes a number of balance adjustments were made, most significantly bringing the Galil and Famas run speeds up and further increasing the FAMAS' accuracy as well as lowering the spread of its burst mode. There have also been a number of console variable tweaks, some making the game more mod friendly and others shutting down exploits, and more robust options for customizing the crosshair were added.

In an hour long preview at Valve's offices Kotaku has learned of some details regarding the new Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, starting with the surprise that the PS3 version will support a mouse and keyboard. Summarising the news:

Maps have received a graphical overhaul but are "largely" intact

The game will ship with Dust, Dust2, Aztec, Nuke, Inferno, Italy and Office

There's a "Casual Mode" with unlimited money, alltalk, and full spectating

There is still "Competitive" mode, with a promise to "raise the skill ceiling"

Valve will be hosting stock servers featuring ELO or friendlist based matchmaking

None of this is set in stone however as Valve has proven willing to work with players, for example armor will not be removed from the game after Source players argued against it heavily. Additionally, in celebration of the latest CS:GO trailer the entire Counter-Strike franchise is currently on sale.

And, on one last note, Valve employee Ido Magal has stated there will be NO INGAME HAT SALES.

In a complete blindside Valve has announced that they will be working with Hidden Path Entertainment to create Counter-Strike: Global offensive. CS:GO is billed as "[introducing] new gameplay modes, matchmaking, leader boards..." as well as "new maps, characters, and weapons".

Is Counter-Strike going to become the next Left 4 Dead? Or is this going to be another Condition Zero? We're all going to find out together.

The CS:S Beta has just received a significant set of updates to various gameplay mechanics, mostly weaponry related, and given the comprehensiveness of this update it's possible that these updates may be a test for porting them over to mainstream Counter-Strike: Source. Some highlights:

Weapons now have separate penalties for jumping and landing, allowing better weapon control after landing (and greatly reduced penalties for falling off small ledges). This also allows for in-air shots with proper timing.

Dynamic crosshair now uses actual weapon accuracy, rather than a separate simulation.

Glock and FAMAS each now use same accuracy for all burst shot bullets.

Increased run speed for Galil and FAMAS.

Weapon spread patterns are no longer square.

HUD elements for health, armor, timer, and money now have a transparent background for better visibility.

Made a convar for lag compensation position change tolerance.

Made lag comp position checks use Length2dSqr (ignoring z).

Fixed an exploit where users could disable flashbang audio effects using alias commands.

In keeping with their tradition of support Valve has released Updates to both TF2 and the Source Engine ranging from new items for TF2 to a universal addition of another menu for tweaking custom mouse acceleration and raw mouse input, which should help high DPI mouse users who are experiencing issues. As always you can follow the link to the full changelog or read the highlights here:

Source Engine (CS:S, DoD:S, TF2, HL2:DM)

Added support for raw mouse input. Raw input reads directly from the mouse, bypassing Windows control panel mouse settings. This addresses issues with high DPI mice, and provides for a more reliable controller experience at various resolutions

Improved custom mouse acceleration

Updated mouse configuration UI to support raw input and acceleration; added tooltips to some of the options

TF2 Specific Changes

Fixed not being able to light arrows after the first arrow is fired unless they're drawn back.

Added the original Ubersaw taunt to the Vita-Saw.

Fixed an issue that prevented the game from running on Fat32 systems.

Fixed a Frontier Justice exploit that let Engineers have infinite crits for their current life/round.

The Iron Curtain: The Heavy's first love (equipped by the Heavy, obviously)

The Enthusiast's Timepiece: Tycho's favorite timepiece (equipped by the Spy)

Additionally Left 4 Dead 2 has an Update as well, marking the return of Gib Fest as a Coop mutator, "featuring" Realism Versus now with faster infected respawns, and the Infected will now be able to tell the speed of the Survivors based on their Glow as well as being able to keep track of the Witch. As with all Steamworks and first-party games you need only restart steam to get the updates.

For some time now Valve has been quietly running a Beta for a new Counter-Strike update, the ancient and almost mythical upgrade that would bring CS:S to the latest Source Engine with as close to no changes to the feel and behavior of the game as possible, deliberately preserving the parts of Counter-Strike that we all know and love from bunnyhopping and surfing to AWP Quickswitching.

Today Valve has released that landmark update, not only adding Mac compatibility but also bringing CSS the latest Source Engine fixes and upgrades:

Additionally, to celebrate the patch (or perhaps beating Modern Warfare 2 in playercount) Valve has lowered the price of Counter-Strike: Source by 66% to a mere $6.80. As with TF2 and other source games to receive Macintosh Compatibility patches any player who purchase one version will automatically have access to the other as necessary, allowing our brothers on OSX to know the truly special fury that only Counter-Strike can produce.

Counter-Strike has become more than just a casual game since it's original release in 1998, it's become an Internet gaming phenomenon. So it's no question why fans have become irritated over the years at the lack of a Counter-Strike 2, and the creator of Counter-Strike, Mihn Le, is no exception to that rule. After issue after issue, Mihn Le announced in an article with IGN his new in-development game "Tactical Intervention."

The game effectively is what Mihn envisioned Counter-Strike 2 to be, the actual title itself having been shelved by Valve for other titles. Mihn talks with IGN in a hybrid preview-interview and talks about the game, his visions for it, and how it all came to be.

I had the opportunity to look at Tactical Intervention when I visited Minh's office in the western part of Seoul. On the surface the new game very much resembles Counter-Strike in appearance; both games run off the same engine so the graphics haven't progressed much. "Graphics-wise, I know it's not the best," said Minh. But the game is definitely his baby as he is finally able to introduce some of the elements he wanted to put in Counter-Strike into TI.

Click here to check out the full article. No solid release date for Tactical Intervention was given, but the game is just entering into beta testing and is projected to be released closer to the end of 2009.

Two small updates for Garry's Mod and Counter-Strike: Source have been released this week. The GMod update includes 15 new Steamworks achievements such as "Startup Millennium" (boot up the game 1,000 times) and "Addict" (log in one year's worth of playtime). You can view all of the new GMod achievements here.

Change log:

Garry's Mod

Added an initial 15 Steamworks Achievements.

Fixed TF2 player and hat models being black.

Fixed some server lagging exploits.

Counter-Strike: Source

Fixed an exploit that allowed files to be uploaded to the server at arbitrary locations in the file system.

Fixed a server crash caused by a client packet claiming to be an HLTV client when HLTV is disabled on the server.

Following a year of brutal school shootings in Germany, several German municipal governments have decided to ban all "killer" games from public LAN events, including Counter-Strike according to GotFrag.com. The shootings, many of which had no explanations, left many German authorities searching for any means to ease the tension and the possibilities of more shootings.

This ban has lead to the cancellation of many ESL Friday Night events and has now lead to the cancellation of the Convention-X-Treme tournament. Tournament managers have given full refunds to all of those who've already bought tickets, and are currently searching for a new venue for future events. The question now remains on whether or not Germany will man this a nation-wide ban, or if it remains the prerogative of municipal governments.

Can't get out of the good old days of 2D gaming, but love Counter-Strike? Then you'll love Counter-Strike 2D! CS2D takes your favorite weapons, maps, and gameplay modes into a 2D environment with a few new additions as well.

You can get your hands on the game right here, or check out cs2d.com for more information.